His virtues are not the virtues of common men; he belongs to the universe, he cannot belong to wife or family; he sucks up the moisture of the earth about him, like a majestic tree--and I, poor plant, I could not rise to the height of your life, I die at its feet.

I have waited for this last day to tell you these dreadful thoughts: they came to me in the lightnings of desolation and anguish.

Oh, spare my children! let these words echo in your heart.

I cry them to you with my last breath.

The wife is dead, dead; you have stripped her slowly, gradually, of her feelings, of her joys.